The present invention relates to a control apparatus and control system that controls a protective apparatus for protecting passengers in a vehicle or pedestrians.
Conventionally, a vehicle has been provided with a protective apparatus (such as, for example, an air bag) for protecting passengers in a vehicle or pedestrians and the activation of the protective apparatus is controlled by a control apparatus. An external sensor (such as, for example, an acceleration sensor for detecting an impact on the vehicle) for determining whether the protective apparatus is activated is connected to the control apparatus. When the external sensor detects an impact on the vehicle, the control apparatus dampers an impact on passengers in the vehicle by expanding the air bag or dampers an impact on pedestrians by lifting the hood of the vehicle.
Since the external sensor becomes faulty due to various causes, the prior art may perform failure diagnosis of the external sensor. For example, when the address set for the external sensor and the unique information of the external sensor are sent from the external sensor, the control apparatus associates these data items and stores them as corresponding information. Then, when unique information is sent from the external sensor, the control apparatus compares the sent unique information with the corresponding information and, if the part of the unique information does not match the corresponding information, diagnoses the external sensor having the part of the unique information as being faulty.